The President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella, “appreciates the work of the teaching staff” of the Iqbal Masih of Pioltello, the institute which found itself at the center of a controversy for having decided to suspend classes at the end of the Ramadan. “I received and carefully read your letter,” wrote the Head of State, in reference to the letter sent to the Quirinale by the school’s deputy director, Maria Rendani, who had invited him to visit the institute the last days. “In thanking you, I would like to tell you – continues Mattarella – that I appreciated you very much, just as – beyond the single episode, which was in reality of modest importance – I appreciate the work that the teaching staff and organs of the institute. in carrying out a valuable and particularly demanding task”, concludes the President of the Republic. However, the criticism does not diminish, reaching Parliament again where Fratelli d'Italia asked a question to the Minister of Education Giuseppe Valditara to find out what he plans to do now.
During the inspectors' visit on March 18, the school board also reaffirmed in a press release that “some irregularities were noted in the resolution on the school calendar, namely the fact that four days of suspension of classes were planned in relation to the maximum of three days “which could be decided by the school, that the resolution of the Region does not provide for the possibility of bringing forward the start of classes to compensate (what they had chosen to do in Pioltello) and furthermore” the absence of express didactic motivations”. Hence yesterday's decision, again by the School Council, to give up two of the planned vacation days (Monday April 29 and Tuesday April 30) by instead confirming the closure on the 10th for Eid al Fitr and Friday April 26, the day after the Liberation.
This decision, the teachers had said, was taken with the sole “educational and not religious” motivation, linked – as had already been explained previously – to the numerous foreseeable absences of the students. It is a choice “born spontaneously within us, on the basis of reasons that we believe are compatible with the right to education and instruction, with the Italian Constitution and which arises from the reflection of the Teaching Body” explained the Council of the institute announcing that on May 21, on the occasion of the World Day for Cultural Diversity, the school will organize a dialogue “on the themes of inclusion, interaction between cultures and comparison between religions.
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